Mark Fast to design a Topshop Range

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Whether Mark Fast’s decision to use Plus Sized models on the catwalk at London Fashion Week was a stunt or not, it’s done him no end of favours. Now Topshop have recruited the designer to produce a range for them.

With his collection going down a storm, with help from added press coverage due to the whole Plus Sized issue, he’s landed himself a job designing for one of the biggest names in female fashion on the high street.

His ethos of designing clothes to flatter a female figure has done him a world of good and his combination of feminine and edgy clothing seems perfect for Topshop. I’ll be intrigued to see what he comes up with when his range hits stores in February of next year.

Plus Sized Models Cause Walk Out at London Fashion Week

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This week is London fashion week, and imagine the surprise that plus sized models have been spied gracing the catwalk showing Mark Fast’s collection.

Apparently the girls were friends of the designer, and had inspired the collection so were put on the runway. Even if it may only be by connection, nonetheless models who weren’t a size 4 or 6 or less were on the catwalk during London fashion week, with the world’s eyes upon them, and that can only be a good thing in my eyes!

However, Fast’s decision to use plus sized models didn’t go down well with everyone. According to the Daily Mail after “creative differences” arouse over the use of the fuller figured models, the stylist and creative director of the collection walked out just three days before the event, leaving Fast in an awkward position.

Fortunately, two freelancers came in to save the day and made sure the show went on without a hitch. I’ve got to say I respect Fast’s decision to stick to his guns and keep the curvier models in his show. Putting them there demonstrated that his clothes aren’t just for the slimmer models but can be worn by bigger women as well, which would have done him a world of favours, as opposed to buckling under the pressure to only use exclusively slimmer models.

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So is this a sign of what’s to come? Fast has been working with Caryn Franklin, (presenter of The Clothes Show back in the nineties) on a project which intends to encourage designers to produce clothes and styles which suit different sized women, as opposed to the straight up straight down girls you universally see on the runway.

With support from designers such as Hannah Marshal, David Koma and Cooperative Designs, hopefully this initiative will bring about a flurry of plus sized models, and I hesitate to say plus because they mustn’t be any bigger than a size 14. But never the less, anything more normal and realistic than the current clothes horses will be an improvement.

Although designers argue that clothes hang better off skinnier models than they do on more curvaceous ones, this cannot be true for all clothes. And in half of the cases the opposite will be true. Some dresses need curves to cling to; others don’t, and if the people who will eventually be buying these gowns aren’t all the same size as the models, why not cater to the majority of women out there who are a little larger?